311–320 of 451 posts
The headline and thesis is completely bogus, because the author has no idea how much Ng's company pays or how much an applicant is earning elsewhere.
And the salary looks pathetic (in USD)
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Yeah, my experience is the opposite. Sounds like you hang out with people in a higher tax bracket than I do, and that could explain some of the difference in experience.
Their behavior certainly has a causal relationship with their tax bracket, yes. The attitude pervades their life. * You know how most folks sleep and drink when they fly? They work on their laptop. * You know how most people come home from work exhausted? They come home energized by the things they worked on, filled with new ideas.
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My brother is in a bluegrass band. They've been around for 10 years now, and there's a lot of music they've played so many times I'm sure they could do it in their sleep. There are a few songs that I really do think they used to do better, back when they were just starting out. Specifically, some of the fast, most technically difficult songs that they used to play right up until they were at the edge of what was poss…
+ 1 for bluegrass That particular form presents an interesting challenge. Many performers tend to stay with memorized breaks, or within certain patterns, that they can do on stage without breaking a sweat. The blood only shows in jams or informal performances. Unlike jazz, where it is not. cool. to play the same solo twice anywhere.
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Didn't Rubinstein humbly then revisit technique and practise religiously in his 40s? (Not to detract from your point, which I think has value). I think that the middle way is key. I've met people who think work for the sake of work is valuable. Others who wouldn't touch hard work with a barge pole. If you cherish success, both are required. Having met virtuoso pianists, I'd say the context which Rubinstein talks from…
>> Reaching the level of mastery where one can sightread any of the Beethoven concerti or a Liszt etude requires a lifetime of years/decades of dedicated practice, but it is true that once you're at that level, you can find diminishing returns on hard work which encroach upon your creativity. I would argue that looking at sheet music and playing it requires very little creativity, if any at all. It is in that arena t…
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All the best jobs are in the big expensive cities. Everywhere around the world, if you want the best job you will need to go to New York, SF, London, Tokyo, Paris, Munich etc. That's one reason why everybody wants to live there. Second reason would is to be close to a large number of people which greatly increases social activities you can do. In a large city even a niche hobby will probably attract enough people tha…
How do you define "best job"? I want to minimize my commute to work. Right now I work about 4 miles from my house, which is a 10 minute drive without touching a highway. If I lived in San Francisco I'd need to make over $300k just to break event when you look at the insane cost of living, and that's not even taking into account the higher federal taxes or California taking its cut. Most people want to live in big cit…
If we stay within the context of software engineering jobs, I'd define it as something using latest tech and pushing new frontiers in different areas (AI, machine learning, distributed computing, dev ops).
So it would be jobs working with interesting tech (things like functional programming, or something like Tensorflow, microservices with Kubernetes and Golang, using newest dev ops and automation stack, distributed systems etc) and on interesting problems and novel ideas. Majority of these jobs will concentrate in big tech hubs where it makes sense to invest heavily into R&D like this.
Outside of major tech cities these jobs will be more sporadic and most jobs will be for companies which treat tech as a cost centre so you will end up working on some boring internal CRM systems made from bunch of enterprise overpriced products with horrible APIs glued together with some Java or PHP code.
>> Right now I work about 4 miles from my house, which is a 10 minute drive without touching a highway.
I live about 15-20 min walk from my office currently. If a city has sane transport system it might be more efficient than driving a car. I understand commuting to work by car is more of a US thing. At least in Europe in most major cities you can use mass transit (and most people do). I don't actually need to own a car and can save money as I don't need to buy expensive piece of metal that will start depreciating the same day I bought it, no need for insurance or parking space.
>> Most people want to live in big cities for the big cities - not because of the jobs there.
Of course. I agree. Lifestyle is a major reason why people want to live in NYC or London etc. But I also think that unique and plentiful career opportunities are an important reason. There are simply opportunities you won't wind anywhere else.
>> In fact, that'd be impossible, because now I have a yard, a dog, and a car. A 10 minute commute in NYC would pretty much require me to be in a small apartment.
This is true. I have only lived in tiny apartments my whole life so imagining living in a house with lots of space and a yard/garden is very appealing. Definitely would prefer that.
I often think about Arthur Rubenstein, the phenom mid-century pianist, for whom a lot has been written about his mission in early life to "practice as little as possible." There's a lot of hyped up romanticism in these quotes and anyone who plays at his level has spent a lifetime playing piano, period. Regardless, his guidance about spontaneity, creativity, and the relationship to practicing too much, which I equate…
Even the strongest advocates of "practice makes perfect" doctrines, such as Anders Ericsson, talk about something called deliberate practice, which is an expertly designed regiment, requiring exhausting mental and physical effort, the close tutelage of a veteran teacher, and adequate rest periods for its positive effects to properly ripen.
These authors typically assess that even a top motivated and well-rested individual can only engage in "deliberate practice" for 4 hours daily at the very most.
So if you want to do that, then far from almost doubling the length of your workday, you should actually cut it in half, and ensure plentiful rest and light recreation before and after your workday. Basically, mimic the way top athletes train.
Otherwise, don't delude yourself that you are "practicing" or "improving". You're simply working, chugging along sub-optimally, doing what you already know without substantial improvement or room to grow or learn much.
These very same authors predict that by working a punishing 10-12+ hour daily schedule, your skills will not improve, and likely will deteriorate, since you will become deeply disengaged (cf The Power of Full Engagement).
The idea that perpetually over-worked, over-stressed, nearly-exhausted engineers are "practicing" or "improving themselves" is a romantic wishful-thinking with no basis in reality or scientific research.
Anecdotally, I've seen such places up close. Most people there burn out and/or move on quite quickly. Turnover in these companies tends to be very high, and they only keep those who can't find a better job.
I often think about Arthur Rubenstein, the phenom mid-century pianist, for whom a lot has been written about his mission in early life to "practice as little as possible." There's a lot of hyped up romanticism in these quotes and anyone who plays at his level has spent a lifetime playing piano, period. Regardless, his guidance about spontaneity, creativity, and the relationship to practicing too much, which I equate…
I feel the same way about karaoke. Do a little bit of practice so you don't look like a fool. But, if you over-practice you'll take the fun out of having your best performance live.
I enforce a militant "40 hours only" policy for my employees, and it's incredible for productivity. When you work longer hours defect rates increase, code quality drops, and things are on fire all the time. You also lose really good people due to burnout. Sustainable pace is super important for creating and maintaining high performance teams. Crassly, it's just a more profitable way of doing business. I wish more man…
I'm mostly the same, but I'm less militant about it and, instead, try to empower my team to handle it themselves. That said, I explicitly promise that any time outside of the normal 40 hours should be taken as comp time. So if someone spends 3 hours one evening dealing with a production issue or we have an upper-management-imposed push to get a feature out, there should be an equivalent number of hours taken off when…
We joke if we get caught walking we tell management that we're in a meeting.
Then came the investment and the big client and the 'big time' and i spent 6mo doing 12-14 hour days and managed to do less work per day. And i never recovered in that job.
It took changing jobs twice to get my swing back (didnt help that job 2 was the total opposite, lazy uninspired team)
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Your 60+ hours per week guy probably doesn't have much of a life outside software engineering. He'd be working between 8,5-12h/day, depending on how many workdays he puts in. At that level of time investment, he doesn't have time for a romantic relationship. Almost no one would be crazy to accept so little attention, but even if they would it would be a weak & shallow relationship. They probably don't have time for f…
While I'm not a fan of 60h per week, I'd disagree here. If you work 12h per day you'll still have several hours in the evening and the whole weekend for your partner. From my observations, relationships don't depend on how much people work, they depend on how much of their free time both partners like to spend together.
Translated: some people can handle an 80+ hr/week lifestyle, while others can't fathom it at all.